Todays Word: sessile \SES-il, -ahyl\, adjective: 1. Zoology. permanently attached; not freely moving. 2. Botany. attached by the base, or without any distinct projecting support, as a leaf issuing directly from the stem. And I was afraid of being grounded, sessile—stuck in one spot for eighteen years of oboe lessons and math homework that I couldn’t finish the first time around. -- Ariel Levy, Thanksgiving in Mongolia, The New Yorker, Nov. 18, 2013 Sessile stems from the Latin word sessilis which had a range of meanings including fit for sitting on, low enough to sit on, and dwarfish (when referring to plants). It entered English in the early 1700s.
Posted on: Thu, 30 Jan 2014 23:13:54 +0000